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- Volume 365
- James Crawford, Chance, Order, Change: The Course of International Law, General Course on Public International Law
Scholarship • Events • Ideas
The Routledge Handbook of International Human Rights Law provides the definitive global survey of the discipline of international human rights law. Each chapter is written by a leading expert and provides a contemporary overview of a significant area within the field.
As well as covering topics integral to the theory and practice of international human rights law the volume offers a broader perspective though examinations of the ways in which human rights law interacts with other legal regimes and other international institutions, and by addressing the current and future challenges facing human rights.
This highly topical collection of specially commissioned papers is split into four sections:
- The nature and evolution of international human rights law discussing the origins, theory and practice of the discipline.
- Interaction of human rights with other key regimes and bodies including the interaction of the discipline with international economic law, international humanitarian law, and development, as well as other legal regimes.
- Evolution and prospects of regional approaches to human rights discussing the systems of Europe, the Americas, Africa and South East Asia, and their relationship to the United Nations treaty bodies.
- Key contemporary challenges including non-State actors, religion and human rights, counter-terrorism, and enforcement and remedies.
The complicated relationship between politics and law has long been a central concern among international lawyers. The project of international law has, for more than a century, sought to construct a zone for autonomous legal decision-making, immune from political considerations, to solve international disputes. Yet the context of international adjudication is, almost by definition, an intensely political one, and the efficacy of international law requires some consideration of that context. International disputes frequently involve high stakes, and so the dream of autonomous law providing technically correct solutions to resolve problems has always confronted the hard realities of international politics.
Regulation 55 was one of 126 regulations adopted by the judges of the International Criminal Court on 26 May 2004. It permits a Chamber to legally recharacterize the facts contained in the prosecution’s Document Containing the Charges, subject to certain important procedural constraints. This Chapter provides a comprehensive critique of Regulation 55, which has already had a significant impact on at least three cases: Lubanga, Bemba, and Katanga. Section I argues that the judges’ adoption of Regulation 55 was ultra vires, because the Regulation does not involve a ‘routine function’ of the Court and is inconsistent with the Rome Statute’s procedures for amending charges. Section II explains why, contrary to the practice of the Pre-Trial Chamber and Trial Chamber, Regulation 55 cannot be applied either prior to trial or after trial has ended. Finally, Section III demonstrates that Pre-Trial Chamber and Trial Chamber have consistently applied Regulation 55 in ways that violate both prosecutorial independence and the accused’s right to a fair trial.
Special Issue: Refugee Law and International Criminal Justice
Deadline for abstract submission: 28 February, 2014
The Journal of International Criminal Justice (JICJ) invites submissions for a Special Issue provisionally titled ‘The Interaction between Refugee/Migration Law and International Criminal/Humanitarian Law' to be co-edited by Fannie Lafontaine, Associate Professor, Law Faculty, Laval University, Member, Board of Editors, JICJ; Laurel Baig, Appeals Counsel, ICTY, Co-Chair, Editorial Committee, JICJ; and Joseph Rikhof, Part-Time Professor, Law Faculty, University of Ottawa.
While on the surface it may appear that refugee/migration law and international humanitarian/criminal law are distinct legal disciplines, a more in-depth examination shows that there have been a number of areas of cross-fertilization between these areas of law with varying results. The Special Issue will provide an opportunity for scholars and practitioners to explore the evolution of the various intersections between refugee and migration law on one hand and international humanitarian and criminal law on the other.
We will focus, for example, on examining the questions raised at the intersections of these areas of law. The wording of four regional refugee instruments — the 1966 Bangkok Principles on Status and Treatment of Refugees, the 1969 Convention on the Specific Aspects of Refugee Problems in Africa and the 1984 Cartagena Declaration on Refugees — extend the definition of ‘refugee’ beyond what is contained in the 1951 Refugee Convention, and explicitly invite the consideration of international humanitarian/criminal law. The reference to armed conflict in the context of subsidiary protection in the European Qualification Directive indicates a similar approach. In a similar vein, the UNHCR has commissioned a number of papers as part of its Legal and Protection Policy Research Series with mandate to include notions of armed conflict, foreign aggression and other terms used in these four regional instruments as well as related concepts such as forced displacement or persecution.
International humanitarian/criminal law has played a major role in the development of the definition of who should be excluded from the protections of the Refugee Convention. Naturally, international criminal law has been influential in determining if a refugee claimant meets the requirements of Article 1F(a), which permits exclusion if the claimant ‘has committed a crime against peace, a war crime, or a crime against humanity, as defined in the international instruments drawn up to make provision in respect of such crimes’. National courts and tribunals have tended to adhere to the parameters of the international crimes mentioned in Article 1F(a), especially regarding crimes against humanity, while also referring to international instruments and jurisprudence to circumscribe the defences of superior orders and duress. Recent domestic jurisprudence, notably at the highest levels in the UK and Canada, has also turned to international sources to determine the legal definition of complicity for exclusionary purposes. Courts have also looked to international humanitarian/criminal law to determine whether a claimant should be excluded pursuant to Article 1F(c) on the basis that he has ‘been guilty of acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations’.
National courts have considered that most such ‘acts’ have been in the nature of human rights violations or terrorist activities. In some jurisdictions, such as the UK and Ireland, however, activities against international peacekeepers acting pursuant to a mandate of the UN Nations Security Council were brought within the parameters of this provision. Furthermore, international humanitarian/criminal law has also proven to be influential in relation to the issue of conscientious objectors.
International criminal law and international refugee law interact in a number of other ways, all of which raise issues related to the possible fragmentation of international law and the need for coherence while taking into account the different purposes of each legal regime: the post exclusion phase and its relationship with extradition and prosecution, including with the obligation aut dedere aut judicare; the consequences on exclusion of an acquittal or of the end of a served sentence following a criminal trial in a domestic or international court; the possible asylum claims of defendants or witnesses in international courts’ host states; and so on.
Some of the key questions to explore in this regard include:
- Is recourse to international humanitarian or criminal law an appropriate approach in defining a refugee or providing subsidiary protection?
- Are all aspects of international criminal and humanitarian law desirable for transposition into refugee law?
- What are the parameters of exclusion and how far can reliance on international humanitarian or criminal law help or hinder the proper development of the concepts contained in these provisions?
- Could international criminal or humanitarian law provide answers to the dilemma of the inability of states to remove a person because of non-refoulement obligations or human rights concerns?
- Are there jurisprudential or policy trends in refugee or migration law which could assist international humanitarian or criminal law?
- To what extent is it appropriate for international humanitarian/criminal law concerning forcible displacement to rely on refugee/migration law?
- Do recent international criminal law decisions raise concerns for refugee agencies working in the field?
The editors welcome submission of abstracts not exceeding 400 words on any of the themes described above, or related areas of interest, on or before 28 February 2014, by email, at jicj@geneva-academy.ch. The abstract should contain the author’s name, home institution, and the title of the proposed paper. Please also send a current CV.
After the abstracts have been reviewed, in March we will invite a number contributors to submit full papers of no more than 9,000 words (including an abstract and all footnotes) by 1 June 2014. All papers will be subject to the JICJ's double blind peer-review policy.
It is expected the Special Issue will be published as the fifth issue of the Journal in December 2014.
For questions, further information, including on the Journal's stylesheet please contact the Executive Editor at jicj@geneva-academy.ch.